Comments

coroander: Certainly on this site the Olympus OM-D E-M5 shows its popularity. Look at the right panel on this page and under "Top cameras". The OM-D appears second under "Galleries", and 6th under "Challenges". There's no camera released in 2012 that appears higher in either of these two "Top cameras" lists.

You are confusing review clicks, which jumped when this article was posted, to the Galleries and Challenges tabs where photographers publish actual photos. One of the reasons the OM-D won this poll is simply that it's a camera photographers like to use. Those numbers are reflected here, in Flickr, and elsewhere.

Certainly on this site the Olympus OM-D E-M5 shows its popularity. Look at the right panel on this page and under "Top cameras". The OM-D appears second under "Galleries", and 6th under "Challenges". There's no camera released in 2012 that appears higher in either of these two "Top cameras" lists.

Scott Bourne writes:"It’s been a month now and I haven’t used my DSLR professionally in four weeks. I’ve shot exclusively with my Olympus OM-D EM-5 camera bodies and micro four thirds lenses. [...]The Olympus is not a perfect camera. Shock. Of course there is no such thing. But for me, (not necessarily you) it is as close as I’ll come right now."

coroander: On the English language photo site, Flickr, the OM-D has the highest average daily number of users for any interchangeable lens camera not made by Canon or Nikon.

Flickr counts users as people using the camera. That is the average daily number of different people uploading pictures from the camera. So it's the OM-D which is actually being used more than any other interchangeable lens camera other than Nikon or Canons.

Someone in the Nikon camp creates a new id (and no doubt voted with it) to try to get Nikon users to vote claiming it's unfair that some people in the Olympus camp tried to get Olympus users to vote. Who cares? It's certainly not gerrymandering.

marike6: Superb IQ. What's incredible is that at ISO 6400, the X-Pro1 is beating all of the other 3 cameras, including the 5D III. An amazing achievement for an APS-C sized sensor. In a way, I think it deserves Gold just beating the FFs in low-light raw performance.

It's about time we gave kudos to Fuji for innovating on the IQ front, and for making a photographers camera, with a compelling lens roadmap.

@TEBnewyork: Any raw converter for the X-Pro1. There isn't a problem with demosaicing, it's just that demosaicing this sensor results in NR. In order to compare other cameras to the X-Pro1 you need to apply NR otherwise you are comparing apples with oranges. When you do, the XPro1 does not preserve as much detail, nor does it have as little noise as it's contemporaries.

marike6: Superb IQ. What's incredible is that at ISO 6400, the X-Pro1 is beating all of the other 3 cameras, including the 5D III. An amazing achievement for an APS-C sized sensor. In a way, I think it deserves Gold just beating the FFs in low-light raw performance.

It's about time we gave kudos to Fuji for innovating on the IQ front, and for making a photographers camera, with a compelling lens roadmap.

@TEBnewyork. The process of demosaicing the Fuji sensor leads to inherent NR. That is NR which cannot be turned off because it's a part of the process of constructing images. Regardless of whether you believe this or not, the Fuji images do not compare favourably against the competition, once NR is added to both (to minimise noise while retaining fine detail.)

marike6: Superb IQ. What's incredible is that at ISO 6400, the X-Pro1 is beating all of the other 3 cameras, including the 5D III. An amazing achievement for an APS-C sized sensor. In a way, I think it deserves Gold just beating the FFs in low-light raw performance.

It's about time we gave kudos to Fuji for innovating on the IQ front, and for making a photographers camera, with a compelling lens roadmap.

You simply need to download the raw files from the other cameras and apply noise reduction. What you'll find is that the X-Pro1 isn't beating anything at all, in fact in under performs. There's inherent noise reduction occurring in the conversion of the raw image for the X-Pro1.

The sampling required to reconstruct images from the X-Pro1 sensor results in inherent noise reduction. If you download the RAW files for comparison cameras, pull them into Lightroom, apply some noise reduction, what you'll find is that you'll get less noise and better retention of detail from a wide variety of cameras than the X-Pro1. What we are seeing is simply a limitation of the current comparison process, where one camera or the raw conversion (e.g. the X-Pro1) incorporates noise reduction.

And of course, IBIS. Makes videos look like they were shot on a tripod, fluid head or shoulder-rig. No more need to lug around big gear for casual shooting and no more shaky footage! Awesomeness!

So far... my only gripe... no magnify in Video mode; not even with MF assist nor if setting Fn2 to muti-function" (which includes Magnify in its' included 4 quick-chose-options). I guess I can switch from still modes to video modes quickly though. Also noticed a small bug. If your Video-mode Exp setting is set to M, it [I]Has[/I] to be in video-mode. Ie: if you hit the video-record button in m/s/a/p, even if video-mode exp. setting in the menu is set to M, it will record in Auto-Exp.

Ah yes, that's right -- main shutter button does video. Great thing is, video still works (and the way you want it to) and you get to use the record button for something useful.

And of course, IBIS. Makes videos look like they were shot on a tripod, fluid head or shoulder-rig. No more need to lug around big gear for casual shooting and no more shaky footage! Awesomeness!

So far... my only gripe... no magnify in Video mode; not even with MF assist nor if setting Fn2 to muti-function" (which includes Magnify in its' included 4 quick-chose-options). I guess I can switch from still modes to video modes quickly though. Also noticed a small bug. If your Video-mode Exp setting is set to M, it [I]Has[/I] to be in video-mode. Ie: if you hit the video-record button in m/s/a/p, even if video-mode exp. setting in the menu is set to M, it will record in Auto-Exp.

@fooddudeone. Easy fix: reassign the video record button to do something useful, like change ISO. Then the only way you can start video recording is to set the mode dial to Video, where the record button works like it should for video (i.e. it doesn't do ISO.)

supeyugin1: Sony 16-50/2.8 has the same equivalent focal length, same aperture and better DOF, and costs $620. It can be also used on NEX via adapter. Panasonic wants to charge twice. They are out of their mind! The rough equivalent of this lens in terms of production costs is $200.

IS & weather sealing add to the cost of production of the Panasonic lens. Faster focus and closer focusing probably also contribute to the higher cost of production of the Panasonic lens.

Kjeld Olesen: Being a user of both a m43 system and a 24x36 mm system, I'd say this is certainly a nice lens and an improvement to the m43 lens array, but surely there will always be reason for m43 users to "envy full frame L glass" - at least until they bring out a 12-35 f/1.4 lens - and if they do, then what will be the point of using m43 anyways? It would likely be larger than a "full frame" 24-70 f/2.8.So lets enjoy what m43 offers in terms of small size and not pretend that it is a replacement for larger apperture lenses.

Having previously owned a mountain of L glass, it's because there are massive size and weight advantages to m43 glass.

And it's because the fast primes are image stabilised (on many bodies), so there's another size and weight advantage of not having to carry a tripod in many lower shutter speed situations.

If m43 glass was simply f/2.8 primes and f3.5-5.6 zooms, then the size and weight advantage would mean much less. But m43 lenses include many fast primes and a number of constant aperture zooms.

If one believes size and wight and image stabilised primes mean nothing, then there's nothing to envy in m43 that isn't available in FF.

Kjeld Olesen: Being a user of both a m43 system and a 24x36 mm system, I'd say this is certainly a nice lens and an improvement to the m43 lens array, but surely there will always be reason for m43 users to "envy full frame L glass" - at least until they bring out a 12-35 f/1.4 lens - and if they do, then what will be the point of using m43 anyways? It would likely be larger than a "full frame" 24-70 f/2.8.So lets enjoy what m43 offers in terms of small size and not pretend that it is a replacement for larger apperture lenses.

Gully Foyle: This release exposes even more Sony's lack of lenses for its NEXs.

Look at the size of Canon's constant aperture 17-55mm f/2.8 (27-88mm EFL) for APS-C and you'll get an idea of why Sony isn't making such a lens for NEX. Canon's constant aperture zoom is more than twice the size and weight of this lens. APS-C sensors are too large for compact systems, the lenses are too big or too slow.